A few years ago we wrote a little application to calculate target heart rates for cardiovascular exercise so that, when we’re working out, we can make sure we’re working in the optimal heart rate range to gain the maximum benefit from the exercise (we found out we were slack and not pushing ourselves hard enough? ).
We decided that others might also find this application useful (especially all you cardio junkies out there) so we thought we’d share it with you.? We rewrote it so it allows multiple user profiles, jazzed it up a little and added a small help file.
The idea is you calculate your target heart rate range based on your age and then, armed with this information, monitor your heart rate while exercising to ensure you’re within this range.? We use the watch type heart rate monitors but you can also check your pulse rate manually using good old fingers.? The calculator also divides the target heart rate range into low intensity, medium intensity, high intensity and very high intensity (psycho intensity if you ask me? ).
We call this program the Target Heart Rate Calculator.? Catchy name, eh?? Yeah, well we were struggling to think of a cool name so we opted for that instead.? Anyhoo, you can download the calculator program from the Target Heart Rate Calculator page.? Oh, by the way, it’s free too.